Enterprise Content Management Products

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Wouldn’t it be nice to contribute content to your Enterprise Content Management system right from Microsoft Outlook? Well, it is possible to accomplish just that with a simple right click of your mouse with ILINX® Capture Email Import.

With ILINX Capture Email Import you can submit single or multiple email messages as well as attachments and complete the indexing in a streamlined and simplified process.

If your organization is like many others, a call from legal or human resources to produce evidence for an electronic discovery (eDiscovery) request can turn into a time consuming and expensive endeavor. Searching through and analyzing emails, electronic files, SharePoint, and other content is an arduous task, especially if all of that information is contained in silos, with no common repository.

We have helped customers, at the very least, from a cost savings perspective; realize savings from de-duplication of content. In many cases, customers can see a return on investment in less than one year!

ImageSource can implement enterprise content management solutions that can collect all of the data in you environment, according to your policies, and make it available for legal search and discovery.

We can advise you on best practice for implementing a “content collection, archiving and eDiscovery” infrastructure that will utilize your file plans, and make sure you address these legal concerns:

“We don’t want to keep too much content”

“We want to keep the right content”

“We want to meet the government’s requirement that consistent, repeatable processes are in place”

We’d love to discuss your specific situation, and leverage our expertise to help solve your challenge. There’s no reason why, with the technology available, that organizations should still be struggling with the same problems from the ‘90s.

A sizable county in the Northwest recently partnered with ImageSource on a major Universal Records Management solution. Implementing Oracle’s latest technology – Oracle ECM Suite 11g – the county’s Public Works and Utilities (PWU) led the shift to an automated system for managing records. By putting a state-of-art records management system in place, PWU is blazing the way for the county to effectively manage records and retention policies county-wide.

The impetus to automate records management at the County included a variety of challenges. They were working from an electronic digital vault for storing documents that had been developed internally and operated with antiquated architecture and technology. The indexing structure was extremely complicated so they had difficulty finding and storing information and the vault had zero records management capabilities. There was no official File Plan in place and content was kept in multiple formats and several locations; paper files, network file system and the vault.

The starting point for the project was to perform a Policy and Procedure review. From that ImageSource Professional Services delivered several reports including eDiscovery and Public Disclosure recommendations, a vault migration strategy, a metadata model and an official File Plan for automating records management with government mandates and regulations.

Once the structural foundation for records management was analyzed, evaluated and a governance plan put in place by ImageSource, the technology implementation was the next step. Oracle 11g was selected as the infrastructure for several reasons. Recently redesigned, Oracle ECM utilizes JAVA programming technology for its ECM suite, providing the most recent Oracle technology and a solid foundation for years to come. 11g also provides a tighter integration between vertical components, which at the end of the day, provides a wider range of choices and more flexibility in architecting and designing solutions. Oracle 11g also provides a host of benefits in the context of the broader Oracle line-of-business platforms – weather its Siebel, CRM on demand, JD Edwards or PeopleSoft – the integrations will be tight. The other Oracle products used to support this implementation are Oracle AutoVue, Oracle Secure Enterprise Search and URM Adaptors for SharePoint and the Network File System.

Utilizing Oracle ECM 11g and its Universal Records Management (URM) module, records management policies are now in place for three workgroups within Public Works and Utilities. A system was designed around the core concept of contribution folders. In order to ease transition, the Oracle software was designed and set up to mimic the folder structures that the County was using on their network file system. The contribution folders have a hierarchal structure and content contribution to the folders is extremely easy with drag-and-drop functionality. The hierarchal structure enables automatic assignment of metadata and records management policies without ever having to key index values. Direct contribution capabilities into the file structure are also available from Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook.

The County went live with this new Records Management solution a few weeks ago and is now moving toward a completely automated records management system in PWU. This solution also provided the County with the infrastructure to facilitate Public Disclosure Requests and to automate records management County-wide. The benefits will be far reaching as the County moves into full production and later expands the many enterprise capabilities of Oracle 11g.

“You may have read about Kodak in the news lately. CEO Antonio Perez commented on the Document Imaging division in his recent address to Wall Street Investors highlighting this division’s market growth and solid cash flow generation.” Again Kodak executives focus on the Channel Partner message. “We need your help to extend new solutions to our customers.” – Tony Barbeau, General Manager

Mr. Barbeau made sure to be specific about the needs of customers in the document imaging solution space. This was well received by the partners as enthusiasm spread throughout the room. Bud Webster and Russell Hunt did a tongue in cheek ‘cheesy’ unveiling of some of the new scanner models being released. Mr. Webster introduced the i5000 will deliver superior productivity with advanced features. This scanner doesn’t slow down when you turn on the advanced features; dynamic flow technology allows the scanner to deliver enhanced image quality and performance. Mr. Hunt introduced the i2600 workgroup and department scanner, this unit delivers the sharpest and clearest document image clarity on the market. The ease of use has been increased with one button scan to SharePoint and an LCD operator panel for the user. When the scanner is not in use the unit swivels upright to provide a near zero footprint this makes the scanner ideal for tight workspaces. Some have said all it needs is a handle for easy portability. Kodak provides a three year worry free warranty term for the Kodak i2000 scanners. This gives customers the peace of mind to purchase a world class scanner that provides 3yr advanced replacement.

Kodak continues to deliver high end microfilm solutions with the i9600 ImageWriter. I know this is still an important function for long-term archival of historical or vital records but it sure seems old school. Nevertheless the Kodak ImageWriter leads the market in performance, durability and feature set.

Russell Hunt went on to comment that, “We remain committed to improve and enhance our process for deal registration to protect opportunities. We are committed to communication about our programs and products. We want you to understand our vision and corporate strategic direction. We will provide you with effective tools to drive business.” “Kodak wants you to be loyal to Kodak, to be a strong ambassador of our products and services. The Channel Partners can help foster open communication and increase sales to help Kodak document imaging group drive growth”.

According to Mr. Hunt no competitor offers what Kodak does in terms of Industry Commitment, End User Knowledge, Technology and the People to help drive customer satisfaction and growth. We are focused on helping you be profitable and successful; in turn this will enable us to drive our growth and goals for revenue targets.

I thought it was cool that that Mr. Gannotti shared Microsoft’s internal nickname for SharePoint, ‘Pac man’. Just like the video game of the 1980’s SharePoint gobbles up other Microsoft technologies and is positioned to be the cornerstone of everything Microsoft does for Web2.0. After Mr. Gannotti’s presentation I asked Mike what he thought the single biggest revenue opportunity was for the Partners in the room. He stated that he thought Workflow consulting was a big area. This is important because Systems Integrators like to consolidate Software Sales, Maintenance Contracts, Professional Services and Hardware to give customers a single point of access. Personally we have found that the revenue opportunities around SharePoint services are valued at a much lower rate than other project work our company does. There seems to be way more buzz around SharePoint than actual Partner revenue being generated. Eventually Partners have to see the dollars come in before a wholesale shift to focusing on SharePoint solutions occurs. As a Microsoft Gold Partner we are skeptical that the revenue opportunity is significant, we have invested time to generate revenue around SharePoint services and projects without much return.

In Conclusion I must first thank John O’Grady, Tony Barbeau, Russell Hunt, Sophia Marchi, Jeff Shuey and the entire Kodak team for the hospitality they showed me as one of a thousand attendees. I was surprised at the amount of focus on the Latin American Region (LAR) in terms of excitement for growth and revenue generation. I believe the America’s partner community and region has much to offer Kodak in terms of innovation, sales and growth. The event continues through the end of the week for Kodak Employees with the Circle of Excellence Awards. Check out http://twitter.com/jshuey for more updates throughout the event.

At an increasing rate, I am getting asked the question “Is SharePoint a good fit for our business”? I shouldn’t single out SharePoint as the question really is “What XYZ product would be best for my ECM needs?” Before this question can even be considered, the business processes need to be understood. Inputs, outputs, systems in place, and platform preferences are all very important to consider. Is there a workflow process to be considered? Where and when is data keyed into systems? Is it keyed into multiple systems?

Talk to similar companies / organizations / departments that have gone through the process. Go on site visits to see how companies are using technology to solve business problems. Get educated. Seek out your local AIIM chapter. Go to relevant conferences that have a large congregation of people who are using solutions for content management. Seek out systems integrators that have multiple offerings and address full end to end processes.

When information is gathered from the RFP process, it usually results in software manufacturers responding with one thing in mind – license revenue. You shouldn’t worry about licenses or product until you have determined your end goal, efficiencies, and points of integration. Also, keep it simple. Successful projects don’t need to overly complex, long, and expensive – they need to solve a business problem.

I don’t usually go to the doctor and ask for a prescription until the doctor has done a thorough diagnosis.

The three word tagline was chosen because it so accurately describes the critical comments of an effective Enterprise Content Management system.

Capture:The more effectively an organization can get information into their system the better they are able to manage that information. Critical content comes into organizations every day. How are you capturing your information? How effectively are you managing all types of content (paper, electronic content, video, pictures, etc)? What technology are you embracing to enable electronic information? Fax machines? MFPs? Desktop scanners? Production scanners? Because Capture is the “on-ramp” to any ECM system, having the right tools (ILINX Capture Products) will enable the success of your ECM system.

Connect:
Seamless integration with line-of-business systems is essential for user adoption, simple end-user training and overall Change Management. With the use of ILINX Connect products, organizations can access all critical documents from one central ECM repository without ever leaving the LOB system they are familiar with. ILINX successfully integrates ECM systems with SAP, JD Edwards, PeopleSoft and others.

Connectivity between different ECM systems is also essential in order to maximize the benefits of all the various technologies. ILINX integrates technologies such as SharePoint, Oracle, LiquidOffice, Kofax, and more.

Share:
Business operations depend on getting the right information to the right people at the right time. Having the right tools to access that information easily is the functionality built into the ILINX Share products. Organizations must be able to export targeted information effectively for public disclosure requests, specific agenda items, invoices, and much, much more. Having that information easy to retrieve in a well organized, usable format is essential.

ILINX products are the cornerstone of many successful ECM solutions. Visit the customer success stories page on our website and see how organizations, both public and private, are creating effective ECM solutions utilizing ILINX technologies.

A breakout session that I attended today was Getting Microsoft SharePoint Content Under Control with IBM ECM. I was going into the class expecting to see tips and best practices on how to configure SharePoint using IBM tools, but there was no tips or tricks.

The class was really about IBM connectors for SharePoint. I thought the IBM folks did a good job of providing a nice and easy UI that integrated with SharePoint seamlessly. Check out screen shots below, taken from my iPhone. The first picture is the indexing screen and the second is the search screen.

What the Experts are Saying: Technical Expertise for ECM

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